Bossaphonik Presents K.O.G.

Event information

On Friday 15th November Bossaphonik welcomes back one of it’s favourite personalities to our stage – K.O.G. (Kweku of Ghana) performing with his 9 piece band, now on a national tour promoting third album “Don’t Take My Soul.”

Kweku was proclaimed as “Ghana’s finest” by Jools Holland after appearing with Nubiyan Twist, a band that he regularly collaborates with, on Later...with Jools Holland in 2021 on BBC 2. At Bossaphonik he dazzled us last December as lead vocalist in the Afro-futurist act, Onipa, at which he proclaimed, “this is not a gig but a ceremony.” We can expect this again and more in his own band – full of deep and funky vintage but modernised Ghanaian dance music - incorporating highlife, Afrofunk, hip hop, reggae and more.

Kweku Sackey aka K.O.G is a multi-dimensional creative force, combining exquisite writing skills with shamanistic live performance, fierce raps, perfectly on pitch singing across a massive vocal range and some absolutely wicked dance moves. Not to mention his skills as a percussionist, arranger, bandleader and art director. A true poet and storyteller, he uses a mix of English, Pidgin and Ga to paint sonic pictures that reach deep into the souls of everyone ready to listen. “I love to make music that CONNECTS, REVIVES , EDUCATES and ENTERTAINS, drawing on the spiritual, physical, emotional and mental well being of us as individuals and our quest to maintain balance with the universe.”

Born in Accra, Ghana, to a nurse mother and marine engineer father who had studied in England, he grew up with a diverse range of international influences alongside Ghanaian styles: Tom Waits, Quincy Jones, Bob Marley, Sizzla, Ladysmith Black Mambazo, Ebo Taylor, Gyedu Blay Ambolley, Atongo Simba, George Clinton, Pavarotti, Warsaw Village Band.
Resident for over 10 years in Sheffield, UK, music has taken him to perform on huge stages all over the world, from Glastonbury’s legendary West Holts stage to Fusion (Germany), Sauti Za Busara (Zanzibar), Kabardock (Reunion) and the Commonwealth Games (Gold Cost, Australia), winning the 2018 Young Commonwealth Performer and performing for Nelson Mandela’s family.

Kweku is deeply aware of his heritage and of his role as an ambassador both through space and time, negotiating culturally both between African and Western influences and between the traditional and the modern: always open to new innovations and ideas while firmly rooted in a deep lineage. This openness has informed recent collaborations with a wide wide range of producers and writers, including Léon Phal, Jembaa Groove, Zed Bias, iZem, Afriquoi, Congo Natty, Scrimshire, Dark Sky, Dizraeli, Chiminyo, Umoja and many more in the pipeline. His brand new third album on French label Heavenly Sweetness, produced by master French producer Guts (Alliance Ethnik) and longtime friend and collaborator Tom Excell (Nubiyan Twist, Onipa), has just dropped this September.

Check out the official video for the “Don’t take my soul” title track:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8JZXpb6Y5-4&t=5s

Check out a new live video from a performance in Paris:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SwoElRyuzGM

Check out the brand new album on Bandcamp:
https://kogkwekuofghana.bandcamp.com/album/dont-take-my-soul

After the pleasure of the live band will be a Bossaphonik club session with guest DJ Boomshank – an Oxford-based DJ and splendid saxophonist who plays in the formidable jazz-grime-hip hop Dutty Moonshine Big Band. He has been part of Oxford's own brass band funksters Temple Funk Collective and also live drum 'n' bass outfit Confidential Collective. Together with Bossaphonik resident DJ Dan Ofer, they will treat the dancefloor til 1:30am to the sounds of…

Jazz Funk * Afrobeat * Afro Jazz * Brazilica * Latin Jazz * Cumbia * Global Hip Hop * Balkan Beats * Soul Jazz * Electro Swing * Global Grooves Galore * Nu Jazz Bizniz!

Friday 15th November
Bossaphonik Presents K.O.G + DJs Boomshank & Dan Ofer
Cowley Workers Social Club, Between Towns Road. OX4 3LZ (Near Templars Square Shopping Centre. Regular buses 1 and 5 go from City Centre up Cowley Road til 3am, stopping opposite the venue)
8pm – 1:30am, live music starts at 9:30pm. Please arrive early - beat the queue!

See ya there!